1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to synchronizing multiple media streams to achieve an integrated output.
2. Background Art
Digital technology has made great progress in recent years. One notable expansion of digital technology has been in the home entertainment industry. Indeed, digital technology is now ubiquitous in modern homes. Common digital devices include DVD and CD players and burners, personal computers, digital cameras and camcorders, video game consoles, digital cell phones, and even digital video recorders. Great strides are also being made in the realm of digital cinema, as image resolution continues to improve and approach that of traditional film technology. For example, numerous upcoming major motion pictures will be shot entirely on digital video, and will play mainly on digital movie projectors.
There are many advantages to digital technology. For instance, digital mediums can store, transmit and retrieve enormous amounts of information exactly as it was originally recorded. Analog technology, on the other hand, is more difficult to access, and generally degrades with each viewing. Additionally, digital information is far more flexible than analog technology. A computer can easily manipulate digital bytes of data, while manipulation of analog information requires more laborious traditional methods.
One continuing challenge of digital technology is image resolution. As noted above, only very recently has digital video begun to approach the image quality of traditional film. Another continuing challenge is that, with the rapid growth of digital technology, there are many different standards controlling image resolution. One only need to shop for a modem television to see a variety of different image resolutions such as 720×480 in interlaced format, 1280×720 in progressive format, and 1920×1080 in both interlaced and progressive formats.
What is needed is the ability to combine similar or disparate sources of digital information, perhaps with differing resolutions, to achieve an integrated output of desired resolution and quality. Such an invention could increase the flexibility of existing technology, or could increase bandwidth in existing technology to achieve ever finer resolutions. One common hurdle to combining multiple media streams lies in synchronizing the media devices used to process and display digital information. The present invention is directed to improvements in synchronization systems and methods.